Souks, Tagine and Bartering
Trip Start
Jan 01, 2008
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84
110
Trip End
Ongoing
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Marrakech,
Morocco
Sunday, July 5, 2009
We have a leisurely breakfast and then its time to negotiate the souks – this time I'm ready for the ambush of the various means of transport and become adept to crossing any roads a few steps at a time weaving between the obstacles. We are staying beyond the souks, this particular area is not on the tourist radar, it’s not even on the map we have – I’m sure other tourists have been here before of course, but we are in fact the only westerners around. The aim once we reach the back of the souks is to find our way through to the main square. – each time we try to enter the back of the souks we have random men stopping us and telling us "this way is too complicated, go that way" (in French of course – and Alex is French so she understood) and then pointing to a wider road – and several times once inside the souks as well we are told “you are going the wrong way” – but this is what the three of us came here to experience, real life, Moroccan life. I didn’t feel right at all to get my camera out and start pointing it at people in this part, so unfortunately I have no photos of it as mainly people were just laying around in the sunshine, or sitting in groups talking but it was a heady blend of excitement verses apprehension - we knew when we were getting in the vicinity of the square because the alleyways became wider, there was less traffic, still mopeds, bikes and donkeys zipping by, but not in the same way, it was brighter and cleaner, people started trying to call us into their shops and sell us things and western faces started to appear. No one before this had tried to approach us – they just looked at us as we walked by – except the men who clearly thought we were lost and going the wrong way - we were lost actually, but intentionally.
Near the square we get sidetracked by a man who offers to let us go up on his roof and take pictures of the view – we are certain this is going to cost us something, but we want to go up and take a look anyway – he’s adamant it won’t cost us anything and he is true to his word – we go up there, talk some more to him and take photos as agreed – then we continue on our way. We get involved in bartering in a few shops - I end up with a beautiful turquoise bag and Alex also secures some purchases, all at bargain prices of course!!
We’re in the main square again and we decide that we’ll jump on the sightseeing bus, so we can get a good view of what is around the surrounding area, so that’s what we do – purchase tickets and go up on the top deck. We get off at the Menara Gardens as on a clear day you can see the Atlas Mountains in the background and it’s quite spectacular – today was far too hazy though, so we didn’t get that view. We took a wander around the gardens, had some passion juice and sat in the shade for a while to get some respite from the unforgiving sun. At the point we boarded the bus we were told that they run every half an hour, so we make our way back to the stop after 20-25 minutes to catch the next bus – this is where we find out that every half hour doesn’t really mean every half hour and we end up waiting, trying to get ourselves out of the beaming heat for around 50 minutes. Eventually the bus turns up and as we are all overheating we opt to stay on the lower deck. We decide that as its now gone 3pm we’ll stay on the bus back into town and go find something to eat. We go into a place that has a terrace overlooking a square – not the main square, a much smaller one, and make our selection from the menu. The man goes off, comes back and informs us that although he gave us a menu to choose from, there are essentially only two dishes available – lamb tagine with apricots and prunes being one of them, which was okay for me as that is what I had chosen anyway, but Alex and John had to change their choice. The man wanders off mumbling something and we asked Alex what he said and she tells us that he was moaning about the fact that the kitchen closes at 3pm really. Anyway he returns in a more genial mood a bit later with our food, which was absolutely delicious – and then we sink into the settees we are sitting on, which makes it very hard to get going again – its nice and cooling sitting there in the shade, soaking up the atmosphere and by the time we summons up the muster to move, it was too late to go and visit the palace which was our original plan, as it would be closing soon. We decide to give it a miss as Alex has been in a couple of times before and me and John have all day Wednesday here to look round.
Instead we head over to the bus station to get tickets for the bus to Essouria tomorrow – we had thought about hiring a car to get over there, but on the basis that the bus would cost us a fraction of the price and the fact that Alex had been before and said we would have no need for a car once we got there, we decided upon the bus option. That done we head back to the riad where they have a very small pool in the open courtyard where we can relax for a bit – so we don our swimmers and get in – it is freeeeeeeezing in there, icy cold after the heat of the day, Alex wastes no time in getting in, she was straight in, me and John on the other hand took a bit of time splashing the water on ourselves to get accustomed to it – once in, it was sheer bliss – a welcome relief.
We sit in there chatting for about an hour, then went and chilled in our rooms for a bit before going back out.
Its still light when we leave, so we decide to make a second stroll through the backstreets and the souks, this we do – once again with people assuming we are going the wrong way and trying to redirect us – and eventually we turn out onto the square again. I see a water pipe that I want to buy – I’ve no intention of using it – I just really like it, so the bartering starts again – its hard bargaining with this guy – he doesn’t want to drop his price very much – but I have decided in my mind a price that I am not willing to pay above, the negotiations continue and we can’t strike a deal, so we leave the shop – we’re walking further into the square and a few minutes later he comes after us and decides he is willing to negotiate after all, eventually we get to a price we can agree on and the water pipe is ours – it was hard work though!!!
We make our way round to Alex’s friends stall and sit down for another round of kebab skewers and chatting, followed by mint tea. Alex’s friend has limited English and we speak even less French, so he tells us we are very, very welcome and anything else has to be translated through Alex. We’re off to the coast tomorrow, so Alex says her goodbyes and we leave the square to go to a shop where Alex bought some slippers last night and then left them in the taxi, so we go back there so that she can get another pair – the man gets seats out and offers us mint tea while we discuss the various slipper options and prices – amongst other things. I really enjoyed being in there watching life go by outside, drinking the mint tea and watching the very comical bartering between Alex and the shopkeeper – he tried to get me and John on his side which was hilarious – trying to get us to agree that Alex had to pay more for a certain pair of slippers because they were hand stitched – it was very funny, lots of tongue in cheek all round – we emerge from the shop around an hour later.
Once again its late and we decide to get a taxi back to the riad – it becomes clear after a short while that the driver has no idea where he is going – he shouts out to a boy on a moped and then starts to follow the moped – unfortunately the boy on the moped has no concept that we are in a car and starts zig zagging in and out of various obstructions – the driver follows on determined not to lose the moped – which leads to an extremely hair raising ride to say the very least – at several points we thought we were going to have a head on collision, John was beside me drawing large intakes of breath through his teeth!!! We did manage to arrive in one piece thankfully!!
